06-07-2018: Gospel of Mercy

Friday of the Thirteenth Week in Ordinary Time

Today gospel invites us to be in touch with the mind of Jesus. The mind of Jesus is nothing but a mental disposition which is filled with compassion for the other. Gospel describes Mathew’s call and the meal offered by Mathew in the honour of Jesus. The world saw a tax collector in Mathew but Jesus encountered in him a great saint as well as and the writer of his own story. Jesus recognized a deep yearning of his soul for the Lord. Otherwise Mathew would not have followed Jesus then and there. In Mathew’s house Jesus dines with the tax collectors and sinners. These sorts of people were sidelined to the periphery. But Jesus preached and lived his gospel of mercy in this periphery. As I write this reflection I know that it is easy to share a reflection from the well furnished altar. But to live this reflection in the periphery is the challenge that Jesus put forward to me and you because it is not sacrifice but mercy that pleases him. Let us grow into the mind of Jesus.